Alligator Records
2001
Deluxe Edition
About This Album
The third non-crossed licensed anthology from the master guitarist focuses on his three-album stint at Chicago's blues-based Alligator Records. The artist considered the music he made during his 1985-1987 association with the label the most honest of his career. Since he received complete creative control on these discs, his 1988 suicide, a short year after Hot Wires -- one of Roy Buchanan's best albums ever -- was released, makes his untimely death even more shocking. With its 16 tracks -- two previously unreleased -- almost evenly divided between instrumentals and (predominantly) guest vocals shared by Otis Clay, Delbert McClinton, and Johnny Sayles (Buchanan tentatively and gruffly talks/sings three selections), this is not only a terrific overview of the musician's astounding guitar virtuosity, but a sad coda to a short yet intense career that never broke him through to a wide audience. "You know I ain't broke, but I'm badly bent" are not only lyrics to "Ain't No Business," but also the sad state of affairs the artist found himself in as he was recording his final disc. With a completely unique guitar style that effortlessly shifted from a crying moan (as in the opening bars) to his cover of Otis Redding's "These Arms of Mine" to a raging howl -- exemplified by the thumping take on Willie Dixon's "You Can't Judge a Book by the Cover" -- Buchanan effectively covered all the blues-soul-rock bases with passion, integrity, and class.
Track List (try tracks 1,3,5,7,9,10 and 14)

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